Through the mask
by Not Just a Nerd
Summary: If only she could see through the mask he wears for the world, if only she could see the love shining in his eyes even when she's in another man's arms. *JALEX* One-shot. My treat to you for Halloween.


**Disclaimer: I don't own wowp. Or offense is intended to Mason lovers.  
**

**A/N: Italics are flashbacks/past story telling.  
**

* * *

His fingers tremble as he lifts his hand and brings it down to touch the shore, the sand wet, cold, soft against his touch as he engraves her name in his neat handwriting. He sits back, stares at the ground, stares at her name, stares at the word that defines his world. He closes his eyes, inhales the scent of the sea, feels the gentle breeze tickle his skin and mess with his hair, feels that longing in his heart again, the throbbing, the yearning, the screeching urge to scream out to the endless sea.

He heaves a weary sigh, opens his eyes and looks down. Her name is gone. A shattering wave washed it away, far, far away from him… like always...

* * *

_He breathes in the scent of her hair, gently rocking her in his arms, trying to shush her crying, trying to make her smile, trying to comfort her. "It's okay." He assures, rubbing her back, ignoring the pain that he is himself feeling at that very moment, and for the same reason that makes her heart ache. She was always more important than him. "I know how it feels right now… but it's gonna be okay…" _

_She sniffles, shakes her head, sobs, hiccups, cries and he hates himself for not being able to do a thing about it. He's always supposed to fix everything and make her smile. He feels like taking off his armor in shame, he doesn't feel worthy to be her knight. _

_"He's gone" The words leave her mouth, a strange hollowness echoing though it, and hit the ground under his feet, making his whole world tremble. "Mason's gone."_

_His eyelids flutter shut, heart setting into a gentle smooth rhythm of pain that he has got accustomed to by now, breath wild against her head. At that moment, it burns inside with such scorching flames that he doesn't even know how to console himself. _

* * *

_He enters his room and finds her sitting on his bed, stiff, uneasy, sad, motionless, eyes on the floor, hands by her side, legs crossed together. And it kills him to see her so broken. _

"_Alex." He says the word like it's a silent desperate plea, like it explains everything he cannot-shouldnot say. "You alright?"_

_She shakes her head, doesn't even try to pretend. "Take me out somewhere Justin. Anywhere! I'm sick of staying in my room! I can't take this anymore." She whimpers to the darkness of his room, to the dim light of the full moon creeping through his window.  
_

_He blinks, watches her, studies her face, observes the tears in those gleaming eyes, cringes at her helplessness. _

_Without a word, he grabs his wallet._

_

* * *

_

_He motions at the kids in the park; she stares off into space aimlessly. He points at the gross couple engaged in too much tongue action, she sniffles. Mad move, he immediately starts regretting. A plastic flying disk hits his head hard, she smiles._

_If it makes her smile, it isn't pain. _

* * *

_She wraps her arms around his neck and sobs into his chest all night. He holds her, fights back his tears, ruffles her hair quietly, makes her fall falls asleep to the sound of her steady breathing, to the maddening scent of her skin.  
_

_When he wakes up, she's already gone, and he's all alone again. The room smells like her, feels like her, seems like her, and it hurts, burns._

_

* * *

_

_Months pass, nothing changes but something does. It's awkward, confusing, and he's so scared to make the first move that he wishes she would just talk about it. _

_She kisses him instead. Everything changes._

_

* * *

_

"_We can't keep doing this Alex..."_

"_It hurts, Justin… please make it go away."_

_

* * *

_

_There's skin and flesh and tongue and lust._

_There's regret and guilt and disgust and frustration._

_And there's Alex and her pleading for help. "Help me, Justin… Please fix this." _

_He's the big brother. It's the job description. He's always there to fix her mess, even if it messes up his world and burns every last thread of principles and morals sticking to his skin._

_

* * *

_

_And he's forgotten the day wolf-boy comes back, left alone in his room, alone in his house, alone in his world of loneliness. She parties with the other guy, goes out for dinner, double dates with her best friend and his best friend. _

_He's just the back-up, the brother, the protector, the one who catches her when she falls. It doesn't matter if it crushes him to pieces of hopelessness._

_

* * *

_

"_I can't do this." She cries, breaking into his room at the middle of a sleepless night. "I can't take it anymore Justin." Her eyes scream for help, shoulders shaking with uncontrolled sobs. _

_Her words burn him, and he knows it's over. She's been trying to fight it too long, but now she's breaking, now she needs to be liberated from this burden of memories regarding whispering words and forbidden touches.  
_

_He kisses her forehead, kisses her nose, her eyebrows, her cheeks, her lips, wipes her tears away with his thumb, holds her in his arms. _

_He pulls back, takes out his wand. The world stands still as he decides whether he should save her and kill himself or vice versa. He doesn't even need to think. There's no second choice. He closes his eyes and just says the spell._

_He opens his eyes to see her confused, clueless face. She blinks, staring at her surroundings. "How the heck did I get in here?"_

_He shrugs, throat clogging with his tears as he forces an annoyed smile on his face. "How will I know what prank you were trying to pull on me?"_

_She grins deviously, eyes back to the twinkling mischievous orbs that he always knew and loved, and not the ones that gleamed with the wrong kind of love for him. "Nah... Not today. I've got a date tomorrow with my boyfriend. Excuse me, dork."_

_She leaves happily, and his eyes burn with unshed tears. _

* * *

A wave touches his feet, bringing him out of his trance of reminiscence and into his state of endless pain.

He freed her from her sinful memories with just a memory spell. He saw her a new life, new hope, a new chance.

She drilled her name into his heart, embossed it there permanently, and there's no way to wash it away. He's not sure if he wants to, even if it burns him… So he's just going to put on a mask of happiness, a shell of normalcy and keep living.

* * *

**Three years later**

It's funny how time changes relationships. And sometimes it seems too tragic.

She was his sister, his best friend, the one who drove him crazy with her habit of causing constant trouble. She was the person he was closest to; she was the person he talked to for hours, sometimes in the privacy of either of their rooms, and sometimes in the open battlefield of the living room and the lair, where their wars were for the world to witness.

And now, he doesn't even remember the last time they talked, has no idea how she is- who she is. Now, here he is, sitting in his dorm room, mindlessly surfing the internet and chatting with his friends. And suddenly, the facebook friend suggestion shows her name, and his fingers are frozen on the mouse. He is not sure if he should click the link and see how she is doing, or if he should maneuver away from the page and save himself from another shock wave of emotions. But then he sees that tiny picture of her in her profile, that twinkling mischief in her eyes, that teasing smile on her lips, that perfect shine in her curly locks, and he can't stop himself anymore.

The page loads in two seconds, but his heart beats a hundred times within that short time, throbbing in a mixture of trepidation and excitement. Her photos are not locked- she was never discrete about herself, always confident that she could scare away any possible troublemakers- and within two minutes, he finds himself drowning in those eyes, swimming in the memories that still flood his mind. He has walked down that road too many times, but her memories are still gleaming as brightly as the tears in his eyes. He finds himself smiling, as he browses through pictures of her making faces at posters of models. And then, he stumbles upon a picture of her with _that guy,_ and it ends. The happy journey is over, the pain renews all over again.

"Hey Justin." A chat box from Zeke pops up.

"Hi." He fumbles with the keyboard of his laptop and manages to type back. These are the times when he feels lucky that people can't always see each other on the internet. Otherwise, Zeke would have seen him close his eyes and inhale sharply as he reads over the "my love" caption that the (stupid, pathetic, idiotic) picture came with. He honestly never realized what she saw in that werewolf. To him, that Mason seems so tastleless, so classless, so cheap. He is too old for her anyway. And he doesn't look good with her. No one else ever did.

"You're coming for my Halloween party right?" Zeke asks.

"Yup." He replies without thinking. He may not be feeling good right now, but after saving that photo of Mason in his computer, printing it, sticking it to his punching pillow and punching him in the face, he will be alright. It's funny how she has reduced him- good boy, the most harmless person around- into _this._ People don't always look into themselves, but then they do, they realize what a drastic change has happened to them through a long period of time. Sometimes he wonders if he is still himself. Would he do something this wrong, this sinful, this immoral? Would he keep holding on to someone he could never have?

"Great." Zeke replied. "Your sister will be there too. See you man."

Zeke is offline before he can even react to this, and now he is not sure about anything anymore. Is it a good idea to see her face to face again? No good will possibly come from it, right?

* * *

On Halloween night, he is wearing the vampire costume he prepared and standing in front of Zeke's door. He has added a mask, though it wasn't necessary or part of the costume, and he has an idea why, but he refuses to acknowledge the thoughts going on in his mind.

He enters the house, and is greeted by the sound of music and people talking and dancing, making him feel like a high school boy for a moment.

Then her scent hits him. He's not a vampire for real, but he can pick out her scent _anywhere_, even after this three-year distance between them. His eyes snap up to her, watching her from the distance- watching her lean onto that other guy, smiling happily in her werewolf costume. Even though she is hairy, she is beautiful. She is always beautiful in his eyes. The real werewolf draping her in his arms seems such a mismatch. But there's nothing he can do about that. All he could do was end all ties with her when she started dating that douche bag and save himself. That's exactly what he had done.

And right now, he regrets it, because he can clearly see that it did nothing to protect him, nothing to end this dangerous thing that he had for her. By trying to repress this, the only thing he had done was made it grow. And now it seems like it is getting out of his control, because he just _can't_ take his eyes off her. He just has to keep looking, has to keep memorizing every single detail about her, every single change that happened to her in the last three years- every single thing that he missed.

She looks happy, and that makes him happy and sad at the same time. He wants her to be happy, but because of him. Yet, he knows that's not possible- that is never going to happen. So he's going to resist the deadly urge to get rid of the third wheel, the obstruction to his dreams, and keep the promise that he made to her three years back….

* * *

"_How do I look?" Alex asked, bouncing into the sub-station in her new outfit._

"_Like a half-eaten apple?" Justin offered, grinning playfully, while he admired his sister in the bright red outfit. "You look great, Alex."_

_She looked at Mason, smiling, raising an eyebrow in silent questioning._

"_You look beautiful, Alex. You always do… But umm, don't you think it's a bit too red?" he asked in his thick smooth accent._

_Alex looked down at her clothes, and nodded. "Yeah, it is. Okay then, I'll go change."_

_She skipped up the stairs, and Justin watched her, staring at her in wonder. "Why did you even ask for my opinion if it wouldn't matter?" he yelled behind her, shaking his head in frustration._

"_Hi, Justin!" Zeke greeted._

"_Hey Zeke." He sighed, letting go of his thoughts and ignoring Mason like he didn't even exist. "So what's up?"_

"_I'm just getting ready for my double date." Zeke said, grinning nervously. "Do you think my Mr. Robot watch goes with this outfit? Harper would freak out if I had a fashion disaster."_

_Justin bit back the chuckle, patted his shoulder, nodding. "So, who are you double dating with?"_

"_Alex and Mason."_

_Justin's jaw clenched, hands forming into fists. He turned around to look at Mason, glaring at him. "Oh! I get it! First you get rid of my girlfriend, then steal my sister, and now my best friend! Ah! Brilliant!" he snarled, storming out of the sub-shop._

_Alex stood frozen in the middle of the stairs, blinking. Why couldn't her brother and her boyfriend just get along? _

_She climbed down the stairs, taking Mason's hand. "Uh, sorry about that. You know how Justin is." _

_Mason shrugged. "It's alright. I don't care what your brother thinks of me. It's you I care about." _

"_Aww." Alex cooed happily, hugging him. _

_

* * *

_

"_Why can't you and Mason get along?" she demanded, storming into her brother's room._

"_Ask him." he snarled. _

"_I don't get it." Alex shook her head in frustration. "Everyone else in our family likes him… except you. Why can't you and Mason get along?"_

_He shrugged, looking away and mumbling under his breath._

"_I want you two to get along. Be nice to him." she ordered, holding up a hand to stop him from speaking. "For me, Justin?"_

_He sighed, looking down, nodding. Everything he had done so far to turn Mason back into a werewolf was for her. Just for her. "Fine. I'll never do anything that you wouldn't like."_

* * *

And now here he is, keeping his promise. Here he is, standing in the crowd, feeling all alone. Here he is, watching her dance happily with someone else without uttering a single word.

He forces himself to look away- the pain will become unbearable if he keeps watching- and his eyes automatically dart to the ground in the wake of his overwhelming sense of defeat. He heaves a weary sigh, tired of being the one standing far away, when all he wants to do is be there with her.

"Sorry." Someone mumbles when she accidentally bump into him, and he _knows_ it's her voice. Before he can stop himself, his thoughts have shut down, and he has grabbed her arm, pulling her to him. The feeling of her lovely curves against his aching flesh send tingles throughout his body.

She looks up at him in alarm, but relaxes as he loosens the grip on her arm, and smiles. That smile can make him cry for days. "I'm sorry, do I know you?"

He shakes his head, doesn't speak, because she obviously did not recognize him. It's disappointing, but it gives him a chance to do something he shouldn't do. But since he's come this far, holding her in his arms, he might go the rest of the way.

It's Halloween after all. He'd like his share of trick or treat.

So, he bends down, and presses his lips to hers.

She stiffens, and he pauses, but then, she kisses him back softly, pulls back quickly, and frees herself from his grasp. "Sorry, dude, but I already have a boyfriend." She laughs, patting his shoulder sympathetically.

He shrugs, forces a smile on his lips, and lets her walk away, watches her walk away, walk back to the guy who made her feel like the queen of the world, the guy who wasn't him. And then she blurs, merges with the rest of the world, living the life that he gave her by freeing her of their memories.

He closes his eyes, purses his lips together, feeling the way her lips felt against his after such a long eternity. It stands still, as if this is a dream, an illusion, and it will all fade away any time if he makes a single movement, as if it might all slip away from his hands any moment. Because he knows that this night will become one of the many memories that he will cling onto throughout his wretched life, and he wants it to be the present, to be the _now_, the _real thing_, for as long as possible.

It relieves his soul a bit, but that pleasure is only momentary, it's the fuel to the fire, it will only increase his pain. He breathes in, the smell of her shampoo still lingering to his costume, and smiles, convinced that this is one of the best Halloween of his life, the others being the ones they spent together.

His only regret? If only she could see him through the mask. If only she could see it was him! If only she knew it was him and still kissed him back! If only she still remembered the best time of their life… If only she could see through the mask he wears for the world, if only she could see the love shining in his eyes even when she's in another man's arms... If only she could see through his mask and know how he burns inside...

**

* * *

(A/N: Happy Halloween in advance everyone! Have a great time! :) Hope you liked my tiny attempt to write a jalex angst in the canon perspective :) please review! That would be my trick/treat.)**


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